Womanhood one day me found, And my brows with roses crowned. In a naiad’s glass I saw, Pleased, my graces touched with awe; And “These royal flowers shall be Forged to links, my boy, for thee,” So I said. From morn till eve Through my haunts the shepherds grieve; But the urchin bursts amain Shouting from my bloomy chain, Bursts and leaves me all forlorn, Pricked and bleeding with a thorn. “Why thus wrong my gentleness, Light, inconstant Happiness!”
All in tears to bring me ease, Back he flew, and made his peace; And my every art I tried Aye to keep him at my side; April floods of tears and smiles, Soft confessions, simple wiles; Then I seized my harp and sang; Far and wide the chorus rang; (Round me flocked the grave, the gay, But the rover would not stay;) “Peerless, wronged, thy votaress, Cruel, fleeting, Happiness.”
Oft and oftener still his flight; Longer still he shunned my sight; Till I left my woodlands dim, And set forth in quest of him To the tourney, feast and ball, (In their turn I peeped at all,) Court, and hermitage, and camp, Still halls where burns the midnight lamp, And the sunk-eyed scholar delves Slowly through the groaning shelves, Where old souls, that erst were men, Speak and teach the young again, And, while creation’s bounds they track, Cast their endless shadows back; Vainly still I sought to find Him I sought among mankind. Still his semblance proved to be Garish Mirth or Vanity; And still of all I sought in vain Good tidings of the lost to gain. The scholar said, “In poet’s book;” The poet, “In some leafy nook;” “Oh, which?” “I know not yet,” he says, “Go thou and seek—’mid clustering bays;” The lawyer, “In the judge’s gown;” The judge, “In ermine’s lordly down;” The peer, “He’s in my liege’s crown;” The king, “He rides the victor’s glaive;” And he, “In peaceful Lethe’s wave, Or, haply, in the hermit’s cell;” The hermit said, “I know him well, Seek him in the house of prayer;” “Nay, I know he can’t be there! Pride shall bravely fill thy place, False and treacherous Happiness!”
Prim sat Pride, then dropped asleep, Leaving me to watch and weep. Round my dimpled shoulders clung My dewy locks at random flung; Wildered strayed my fleecy band; Loosed the crook my listless hand, Playing with the dreary rue At my cavern’s mouth that grew, And forgot its tuneful craft. At my plight the shepherds laughed; “She is sick at heart, you know; She loved,—wise maidens do not so; So fare all idle fools who chase The subtle, coy sprite, Happiness!”
